Propagation of building blocks in SGA and MPGA

Abstract

The goal of this paper is to demonstrate the rate at which building blocks evolve in time during run of GA. We compare the building block propagation rate for the simple genetic algorithm (SGA) with the building block propagation rate for the migration (island) genetic algorithm (MPGA). The results are checked against the lower bound given by Holland's schema theorem. Using genetic programming, we made symbolic regression on the number of individuals matching given schema versus generation number. As a result, a new expression describing the propagation rate was found, and its correctness was confirmed in all cases considered in the paper.